Official Minelab GPX 6000 Page

[afreakofnature]

Nobody’s going to reveal anything if they were smart LOL, why give away what this detector is doing before you get all GPX6000 gold.  Reports will come out next year, or from noobs that haven’t learned yet that loose lips sinks ships 🤣🤣

[RONS DETECTORS MINELAB]

The Equinox works really good at finding small gold in low mineralized ground. So if the 6000 can closely match it in highly mineralized ground that would be a huge breakthrough, for me even if it comes somewhat short of matching the Equinox in these harder conditions I’ll be very content. That would be a high bar I’ve never thought could happen with metal detectors. 😃

No ferrous I’d, I can live with this, maybe my Equinox can fill this gap working together with the 6000. As for larger gold I’ll be very happy to see it come in  even a little short of 20% depth gain over the 5000 in heavily mineralized ground as the performance chart shows.

What does this performance chart measures by means of the stars, is it a depth comparison without giving any actual measurements ?

The attached Gold Bug 2 depth chart really shows how high the bar has been set in the past for smaller gold in low mineralized ground, I’m not expecting this to be surpassed though. 

My thanks to Minelab for making a lighter weight PI with no cords.😊👌

 

 

[Steve Herschbach]

2 hours ago, NV-OR-ID-CAL-AU said:

I’ll be very happy to see it come in  even a little short of 20% depth gain over the 5000 in heavily mineralized ground as the performance chart shows.

That’s not what the chart shows. Each star is not a relative percentage that translates directly to a number like that.

[GB_Amateur]

14 hours ago, jasong said:

The 14" DD weighs 1015 grams which makes swinging it heavier than a 5000 with the 11" coil (820 grams) and not a ton lighter than the 15x12 Commander (1120 g).

Do all those measurements include a coil cover?  I have a Coiltek 14" Elite Mono that weighs 1142 g with cover.  I also have a Nugget Finder 7"x14" mono which comes in at 705 g (incl. cover).  I realize this NF coil doesn't have the fancy windings of many of the recent releases but if coverage/weight is the key metric for some applications, wouldn't that be a consideration?  Oops, I forgot, the GPX6000 isn't compatible with the hundred or so (?) previous generation GPX coils....

[jasong]

Think it's with coil covers. But even just ballparking weight comparisons, the 14"DD (and to a degree the 17" mono) appear to make the machine as heavy as a 5000, a machine which notably is not considered a "light" machine and hence my confusion about why the 6000 is considered light or doesn't need a bungee. I never met anyone in the field who was swinging the 5000 without a bungee, other than patch cleaning where one stayed in the same place and set the machine down often, or using stuff like Sadie's.  So I'm not understanding why everyone seems to think it's now lightweight to swing the same weight on the 6000 with the 14DD?

This type of question can be subjective though, maybe ergonomics are that much better, and is best answered by actual use in field reports by experienced detectorists who've also spent a lot of time swinging a GPZ and 5000 in order to have a reference frame to report upon.

For those who simply want/need a smaller coil in the 11" mono, or those who don't already own a GPZ I can see the point of purchasing without knowing these things I listed earlier. But for me, I need to know before dropping 6k, and since I don't care about the 11" mono (I already own smaller GPZ coils), I remain unconvinced the claims of lighter weight have any relevance to me. But performance wise, I'd be stupid to ignore anything that gives me power I can put to use profitably that I don't currently have, so I am still paying attention to the 6000 even if I'm not in the pre-order gang, hence my frustration that ML won't seem to allow any real field reporting from actual prospectors who's opinions I would value.

[Jonathan Porter]

7 hours ago, geof_junk said:

Just remember that testers will tell the truth but being tied to ML it will be stupid of them to indicate the faults in a disapproving way. 

If that was the case then you could also consider the feedback I gave to ML during development was bound by a similar roadblock!! So yay double whammy!! 😔  But it actually gets a lot worse, DO NOT pay any attention to anything I write because not only am I a field tester but I’m also a scummy dealer who would tell you anything just to make a sale!!! Better grab up all the ML detectors since 1996 and throw them away because I was a field tester on all of them!!! 

In all seriousness this type of insulting comment grows so tiring after all these years, my primary function as a field tester is to be absolutely honest about what I experience in the field and would probably explain why this dinosaur is still doing field testing after all this time!! But now its being suggested my input be excluded or treated with suspicion because of suspected bias!! So after all these years my input is questionable is it, in spite of the hundreds of thousands of ounces that have been recovered with ML detectors world wide in that time? 🤔 

I would like to know what exactly people have to ‘Remember’ after all these years? What ‘Truth’ is needed here? 

[Jonathan Porter]

The 6000 does what the 5000 can do depth wise on larger gold even slightly better, but what’s the point of providing it that way to the market when there is already something much better out there for that purpose in the form of the 7000? Hence the 17” elliptical coil rather than say an 18” round monoloop.

A 17” elliptical will be a very good coverage coil for prospecting purposes with pretty good depth on larger pieces, but it is not about outright depth, you have ZVT for that. The GPX 6000 with the largest coil you care too put on can never attain the depth of the 7000 with its standard coil!! Having a lightweight coil with 17 inches of coverage with the sensitivity to snag a 0.01 gm piece is nigh on diabolical, this concept will take shape once operators get their hands on them.

Ergonomically the 6000 is brilliant with the supplied standard 11” mono coil, that coil size is perfect for one handed operation with nil support devices unless you are unused to detecting. The standard 11” coil has the ability, if you care to invest the energy, to find tiny pieces right down to the ‘wet your finger to pick it up’ GM 1000 level!! 

So this then begs the question, what is the GPX 6000 good for? I very quickly learned to target a specific type of environment to maximise the 6000 benefits. The first and key approach was to target old areas were I’d previously found multiple targets within 100mm of the surface, in almost all cases I tend to stick to ground where bedrock is visible and work out from there but mainly sticking to ground up to or around the 12” mark as the targets the 6000 is VERY good at reside at less than those depths (inverse square law).

Hot ground is not a problem (usually the shallow gravels are more mineralised as the top layer has been washed or blown away), If the ground becomes problematic due to conductive signals or salt signals or EMI then I revert to the DD coil and use that option (truly amazing sensitivity to tiny surface targets using the DD), I will however tend to stick to ground less than 10 inches as the depth is less with the DD relative to target size. The bulk of the gold I find with the 6000 is in the sub gram range but I have hit on some pretty decent stuff whilst out and about thanks to the good outright depth of the tech, this is reassuring as often decent targets are found due to time spent and the ground covered during that time, so its nice to know if you get your coil over a decent nugget or speci at depth then your in with a chance. 

The 6000 is not a tiny gold only detector, but operators can only swing one detector at a time, there will be a cross over on some target sizes between the various techs (SDC and GPZ), however what it does do it does exceptionally well as such there will be a pretty decent range of targets that it outperforms everything on. It is nice to know while your taking advantage of the tech behind the GPX it can still compete with its predecessors and also the modern big guns. 

JP

[mungass]

Sweet , thats why i,m putting the 4000 ,its arsenal of coils and steelphase and cords and bungees in the cupboard ,and getting one , thanks for that , CAN"T WAIT  .  start holidays on the 27th for a month ..........hope its out then ..................

 

[kingswood]

25 minutes ago, Jonathan Porter said:

Ergonomically the 6000 is brilliant with the supplied standard 11” mono coil, that coil size is perfect for one handed operation with nil support devices unless you are unused to detecting. The standard 11” coil has the ability, if you care to invest the energy, to find tiny pieces right down to the ‘wet your finger to pick it up’ GM 1000 level!! 

JP

Thanks JP! This statement is the key for me anyway! I have buggered shoulders and whilst I love my 7000, I cannot swing it for more than 2-4 hours. Even when doing that short period, I literally am in agony for the next couple of days.

Makes sense to me that if I can swing the 6000 for 6-8 hours, then the extra hours increases the chance of gold. Simply swinging for longer equals more chance of success. My 7000 wont find much gold if its sitting in the cupboard as I am in to much pain to use it There have been plenty of days when I have just not gone detecting as I know whats going to happen after. Hopefully with the lightness of the 6000 I get more time on the ground and much less pain!!

[jasong]

Thank you JP, thats the kind of stuff we've been missing. Are you allowed to talk about all field experience now freely or still limited?